I still remember the first time I heard We Five's 1965 hit "You Were On My Mind." It came on my bedroom radio when I was 8 or 9, and I quickly began taping it, mistaking its slightly androgynous harmonies for the Everly Brothers. Before long, I realized I was wrong, but the song's joyful ascent, starting with a solitary drumbeat and surging to a cascade of harmonies and percussion, hooked me so much that I didn't erase the tape.

Band and musicians have a certain something that defines them. People know Bob Dylan for his stream-of-consciousness lyrics and nasal voice, the Beatles for their catchy Mersey beat and Van Halen for its ear-splitting guitar solos.
The Fountain Valley...

It's no small feat to decode the lyrics of Don McLean's "American Pie," but most critics I've read believe "the jester" in verse three is a reference to Bob Dylan. That's the character, of course, who sings "in a coat he borrowed from James Dean/and a...

I enjoyed some of what you had to say about my friend Bob Dylan ("Dylan worth the time, no matter the quality," City Lights, July 14). As for what the media has to say about him, it's the same old stuff. And as for the word "icon," you in the media need...

The thought hit me the other day, about the time the news broke of former Monkee Davy Jones' death, that I might live to see the '60s.
Those would be the next '60s, of course. When the year 2060 hits, if I am still around, I will be 81, not an uncommon...

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President Obama? Yes, you got some scathing reviews for your performance in the first debate, but we all have our listless days.
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A few years ago, two of my Canadian cousins were visiting California and stopped back at the house enthused.
The cause of their excitement? They had been driving around in their rental car when the Beach Boys' "I Get Around" came on the radio. After years of listening to the band's lush harmonies, they had finally heard them in Southern California itself — an experience probably more authentic than the rides at Disney California Adventure.
It says something about the timelessness of the Beach...

It's heartening sometimes to see a prediction come true.
Two months ago, I wrote a column about the P-Cats, a Huntington Beach blues-rock duo consisting of spouses Ed and Trace Paredes. I mentioned how the pair had embarked on a lifelong dream of fronting a band after Trace's doctor diagnosed her with leukemia, and how, given the circumstances, there probably wouldn't be any "half-heartedness" in their first release.
Last week, I called the Paredeses to check on their project. And it turns out that,...

Bob Dylan Photos

The director listened to the six women rehearse a song on the stage at the No Square Theatre and buried his face in his hands.
"I'm hearing pretty singing that's lacking testosterone," said director Joe Lauderdale, who sits on the Laguna Beach theater's board of directors. "I want you to have fun with this by playing a brusque and dumb athlete."
Laughter cut through the theater's storied Legion Hall.
The actresses were rehearsing No Square Theatre's upcoming musical comedy, "Bent Broadway," where...

I had a vague sense that there had been something enervating about 2014, and then Slate put it beautifully in words. Actually, words were only part of it: The online magazine assembled a remarkable graphic that featured a series of tiles, each one indicating what people were outraged by the most on each of the 365 days. The headline, needless to say, proclaimed it "The Year of Outrage."
In the grand scheme of things, that title is about as meaningful as proclaiming 1992 "The Year of the Woman." Outrage,...

Judy Collins has plenty of memories of her childhood Christmases. Her father, who ran a radio show, would bring home store employees who had given him good bargains. Fruitcakes were a staple of the family kitchen, baked early in the season and drizzled with rum to keep them moist.
And Collins recalls the prayer she used to recite before the time came to open her gifts: "Dear God — no books, no clothes."
Considering that Collins later became an author herself — her memoir, "Sweet Judy...

Under the glare of lights in a room typically kept dark for performances, David Worthington took the microphone and gave voice to a man who hadn't been heard that evening — not in person, anyway, in this theater half a world removed from his home in Iran:
I hear the 15th bone snap … a razored stem piercing my mottled skin.
The hooded men retire for evening prayer.
It's cold, and I've no letters, no photographs.
The microphone faltered, and Worthington, who read his newly crafted...